This morning I finished reading Henry Cloud’s book “Necessary Endings.” Let me rephrase that: I came to the end of the book this morning and I’m already re-reading it. Some books are like that.
One of the last concepts he talks about in the book is the idea of metabolizing a situation, experience, or outcome. The idea is simple. In physical terms, our bodies take in two types of foods: useful and wasteful. Useful food gets digested and put to work. Wasteful foods get processed and left behind. While the thought of creating a more graphic visual is enticing, I will leave it at that.
Healthy people metabolize well.
Healthy organizations metabolize well.
Healthy relationships metabolize well.
The problem is … outside of the physical manifestation of metabolism, most of us never do it. We experience a setback and don’t take the time to dissect what went right and what went wrong. We experience a traumatic event and don’t reflect on what we learned and what we hope to avoid in the future. We hit a home run and forget all the little pieces that went into a larger success.
In terms of negative experiences, a failure to properly metabolize a situation almost always puts us on the track of repeating it in the future.
How is your metabolism?